Claim: Video shows Chief Minister of Punjab Maryam Nawaz and Chief of Army Staff (COAS) Asim Munir hugging and kissing each other.
Fact: The video is AI-generated.
On 22 January, an X user posted a video (archive) purportedly showing Maryam Nawaz and Asim Munir embracing and kissing each other. The caption, which appears to be mocking the contents of the video, states [translation]: “This is wrong and one should not do this.. What should one not do?? This!!”
Women politicians in Pakistan have been continuously targeted with disinformation campaigns in the past which can endanger their safety. Soch Fact Check has previously debunked similar AI generated videos and photos here and here.
Fact or Fiction?
Reverse-searching keyframes from the video revealed that it is AI-generated.
Posts from nearly a week ago featured the original video of Maryam Nawaz. She is in the same attire as in the video in the claim. However, Nawaz walks towards and embraces a woman whose back is towards the camera. Asim Munir is not visible at any point in the original footage, confirming that the video in the claim is likely AI-generated.
Moreover, on 18 January, Nawaz shared a longer promotional video (archive) on her official X account and wrote, “The story of a talented daughter of Punjab”. It opens with the same scene of Nawaz walking towards and embracing a woman on stage, and shows her awarding the Honhar scholarship to a female student, a merit-based scholarship that is awarded to students within Punjab.
Soch Fact Check then analysed the video closely for typical signs of AI-generated visuals. At timestamp 0:05, we can see the video pauses momentarily. Then Maryam’s facial features, her jaw line and hands change slightly, appearing to move in an unnatural slow-motion compared to the original footage.
At this point, Munir’s two-dimensional figure appears suddenly towards the left of the frame. As he turns to Nawaz to embrace her, his figure also starts to move in an unnaturally slow manner. Throughout the video, Munir’s figure is barely human-like, resembling more of a video-game caricature that has been edited into the footage.
A logo “Vivavideo” also appears in the bottom right corner of the footage, suggesting that some aspects of the video might have been edited. However, no such logo appears in any of the original videos of Maryam and the student at the award ceremony.
Soch Fact Check, therefore, concludes the video is AI-generated.
Virality
The X post garnered 143,200 views and was liked 2,600 times.
It was shared on Facebook here, here, here, here, here, here, and here.
Conclusion: The video of Nawaz and Munir hugging and kissing each other is AI-generated.
Background image in cover photo: Pakistan Today
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